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The Humanist Connection and AHA!@Stanford are pleased to announce the always controversial David Silverman, Executive Director of American Atheists, will be visiting Stanford campus to talk to us about “Seeds of Doubt: Normalizing Atheism the American Atheist Way.”

David Silverman is President of American Atheists and was the creator and Executive Producer of the 2012 Reason Rally. Mr. Silverman has appeared on most major news programs including The O’Reilly Factor (spawning the famous “WTF meme-face”), Scarborough Country, The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, CNN’s Paula Zahn NOW, Nick News, Hannity and Colmes, FOX and Friends, NPR’s All Things Considered, and many more. David hosts theAtheist Viewpoint TV show with co-host Dennis Horvitz.

This event will be FREE for Stanford students, and only $6.50 for the public!

The Humanist Connection is happy to announce that Peter Boghossian, author of the extremely popular and controversial book, A Manual for Creating Atheists, will be making a Stanford stop on his book tour.

The Humanist Connection is happy to announce our next Community Dinner on April 16, 2014 at Cafe Pro Bono at 7pm. [rsvp here]

(photo: Dr. Robert Siegel)

(photo: John Figdor)

Dr. Robert Siegel, Professor in the Human Biology Department at Stanford and winner of a plethora of distinguished teaching awards at Stanford, including the Gores Award, the Henry J. Kaiser Award, and the Bing Award will give his thoughts on the “religion and science” conflict, and join us for a conversation facilitated by Humanist Chaplain at Stanford, John Figdor on “The COSMOS and Creationism: Worldviews in Conflict” discussing the new Neil DeGrasse Tyson reboot of Carl Sagan’s classic COSMOS series.

The COSMOS has caused considerable consternation among religious fundamentalists. Beyond rejecting claims made by the COSMOS series, such as “the universe is roughly 13.8 billion years old,” religious fundamentalists are concerned that the COSMOS provides a coherent secular epistemology and world view, and therefore, a secular alternative to religious world views such as Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. Join us for a scintillating conversation about science, rationality, religion, culture, epistemology, and faith.

We will be hosting our event at Cafe Pro Bono at 2437 Birch St, Palo Alto, CA 94306. They have put together a prix fixe menu for our dinner for $40 per person (covers tax and tip as well), which includes a vegetarian option (we’re still looking for a good restaurant that can provide vegan food, so email us if you know one!).

We ask that people consider making a $10-$20 suggested donation to the Humanist Connection so that we can continue to put together high quality events such as this one. Please make out checks to the Humanist Connection, or talk to Exec. Dir. John Figdor about how to pay via credit card or cash.

Space is limited to 20 at this dinner, so RSVP HERE! http://www.meetup.com/HumanistConnection/events/174761352/

Join Humanist Chaplain at Stanford, John Figdor, and Roy Speckhardt, Executive Director of the American Humanist Association, for coffee and conversation about the state of Humanism on college campuses on Monday, March 17 at 2pm at CoHo in Tressider Hall.

Join AHA! and the Humanist Connection (www.humanistconnection.org), and our friends, Stanford/NASA Astrobiologist Dr. Lynn Rothschild, Stanford Medical School Professor Robert Siegel (winner of a plethora of distinguished teaching awards at Stanford, including the Gores Award, the Henry J. Kaiser Award, and the Bing Award), and Stanford Professor and Mac Arthur Genius Award winner, Dr. Bill Durham for a celebration of science, reason, humanity, and ideas of Charles Darwin. We’ll have short TED-style talks on Darwin, biology, and humanity, light refreshments (free!), and a Darwin Day pub night (for 21+ students and community members).

“Charles Darwin is even more than the author of the theory of evolution, as great as that is,” Rep. Holt said. “He represents a way of thinking, a philosophy, a methodology. It was his thirst for knowledge and his scientific approach to discovering new truths that enabled him to develop the theory of evolution. This lesson, about the value of scientific thinking, is almost as valuable as the theory he uncovered.”

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The International Darwin Day Foundation (darwinday.org), founded by Dr. Robert Stephens in 1993, is a project of the American Humanist Association. Its mission is to promote the public education of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and to encourage the celebration of science and humanity.

The human journey is an emotional quest to find truth and meaning. Countless books have presented this journey through the eyes of people who concluded their search with devotion to God, salvation by Jesus, or commitment to religion. But there’s a changing zeitgeist in America and the world: a growing number of people are finding truth and meaning from the opposite perspective. Through 25 personal narratives, Generation Atheist tells their stories.

The people in this book come from different religious upbringings, races, sexual orientations, and genders. Many have gone through very emotional journeys in coming to a sustained, open atheistic worldview. Most were quite religious at one point in their lives. Through the internet, humanity is engaged in a global conversation unlike any before in history — about who we are, why we are here, and how we should live — and these individuals have an important perspective to share.

Humanist Connection Community Dinner: Meet the Chaplain

January 8, 7pm
Calafia Restaurant in the Town and Country Shopping Center
855 El Camino Real in Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to the first Humanist Connection Community Dinner! We will be meeting on January 8, 2014 at 7pm in the Town and Country Shopping Center at 855 El Camino Real, in Palo Alto. I’ll be giving a brief five minute introduction to our community and then speak for a few minutes about our first topic, “pathways to Humanism.” Then, we’ll have dinner together and talk about how our views about religion and god evolved throughout our lives.

This event is free, and open to the public, although we ask people to consider supporting our community with a donation if you enjoy our events. We are limited by space to 20 participants for our first event. Participants will be expected to order and pay for their own dinners (dinners range from $18-22 per person and include vegetarian friendly options).

From ancient conjurers to quick-handed con artists to big ticket Las Vegas illusionists, magicians throughout the ages have been expertly manipulating human attention and perception to dazzle and delight us (or scare us, or steal our watches). Of course you know that the phenomena of cognitive and sensory illusions are responsible for the “magic” of a magic trick, but you’ve got to admit it still kind of freaks you out when some some guy in a top hat defies the laws of nature right in front of your eyes. Come meet neuroscientist Adam Gazzaley and magician Robert Strong as they team up to demonstrate how magicians use our brains as their accomplices in effecting the impossible — and to explain what scientists can learn about the brain by studying the methods and techniques of magic. This event is presented in partnership with Ask a Scientist SF and the Humanist Connection at Stanford.

We are organizing under the “San Jose Coalition of Reason” name so we can include all the other secular groups in the area.

We are members of the Foundation Beyond Belief super team because FBB pioneered the secular association with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Plus, as a bonus, the Stiefel family has pledged to match the first $250,000 we raise for LLS until December 31, 2013.